Empire of Dirt
by MarcellaDix
Summary: A century has passed since Lord Voldemort's conquest of Wizarding Britain, and he looks back upon all that he has achieved, and all that has been lost in the process. - Song fic. Contains mentions of death, self-hurt, torture and other kinds of violence. No chapter-individual warnings. Mature readers only, please.
1. Pain of the Unfeeling

**Pain of the Unfeeling**

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The morning of May 2nd, 2098, dawned with an air of boredom, as if nothing special had happened, really, while all over Britain, celebrations of the 100th anniversary of Lord Voldemort's victory over the misled teenage vigilante Harry Potter started.

And Lord Voldemort was bored. The past century had witnessed kingdoms rise and fall, presidencies regretted and re-elected, wars feared and fared - one greater than all that had come before, called the Big Third - but none of that had touched Wizarding Britain, none of that had influenced his reign, none of that had moved Lord Voldemort, for Lord Voldemort was unmoved, unmoving, stagnant.

His rule was stagnant.

That night, a hundred years past today, the wizarding populace of the United Kingdom had yielded to his reign. He had instantly been made Minister of Magic, but the moment he had achieved total power, it had bored him to death.

Only - there was one thing Lord Voldemort was incapable of doing: die.

These days, his life consisted solely of bureaucracy, fighting paper instead of wizards, fighting regulations instead of ideals. And even when he did fight bureaucracy, there was no real fight in that, for no one dared to contradict him, all-mighty ruler of Wizarding Britain that he was.

Bureaucracy was a pain in the arse, but it left Lord Voldemort unfeeling as ever. There had been times, he knew, when he was still able to feel things, to experience life, but that was a long time past. The last time he had felt something, really felt something, was the day Harry Potter had fallen at his wand.

Pain.

Immeasurable, excruciating, painful pain. The kind of pain that you feel when a piece of your soul dies.

Lord Voldemort had not known that Harry Potter had possessed a miniscule piece of his soul, but killing the boy had made that little matter crystal clear. Not that there had been anything to be done against that, but the pain -

These days, where nothing ever happened anymore, Lord Voldemort almost longed for that pain.

"Nagini."

The word had been a mere whisper, but his familiar understood it to be the command that it was. Slithering from under his bed where she had been resting, the huge snake made her way up to the cushion upon which her master rested. She knew what he wanted.

In the beginnings, she had resisted him, not that it had done her any good. That resistance had been trained out of her fast enough, though, and she had begun doing as she was bid, no matter how much she hated it.

Lord Voldemort had hated it in the beginning, as well. That had been the whole appeal of the measure - feeling something, even if only hate. With all of Wizarding Britain yielding to his terror, there was no excitement to be had any more, no bloodlust to be satisfied, no pain that came with the conquest. But there had to be other ways to feel pain, surely, and Nagini helped him with those.

He saw the question in her eyes and offered up his wrist. The giant snake did not hesitate to thrust her fangs into his white skin.

There had been a thrill to be had in this, this self-hurt, if one wanted to call it that - for what was Nagini if not a mere extension of Lord Voldemort? With no one left who could still hurt him, the only victory to be gained was over himself, Lord Voldemort knew, and battle he did. Playing one piece of his soul against another, making them battle and hurt each other - there used to be pain in that. These days, the holes Nagini's fangs tore into his skin barely fazed him, and the pain was nothing but a sting, old and familiar as his familiar herself.

Still, it was at least some measure of pain, and it was a way to feel again. There was a future to be found in the hurt. It could make him forget for a while, forget about the stagnation in his politics, the numbness in his life, the fact that he existed without a purpose, just biding his time while his rule was everlasting. The only blood Lord Voldemort could spill these days was his own. He spilled it anyway, hoping to forget about his own miserable pedigree, half legend, half dirt; hoping to forget about the blood of the people he had killed to live forever, for they had been lesser than him, yet he had needed them to secure his future; hoping to forget about the encounters with death he had gone through to reach immortality.

But he remembered. Everything. Every little thing he remembered: how death had allowed him to escape, how the measures he had gone to in order to prevent his own death had scarred him, had hurt him - every little thing reminded him of death, and there was no peace to be had from those constant thoughts, those plentiful memories.

His immortality was tainted by the ever-present company of death.

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 **A/N: This little story has been in my mind for a few weeks now, and I've decided to sit down today and write the first installment. There will be two or three chapters after this, in similar length, I assume. This story was inspired by Johnny Cash's version of the song "Hurt". This chapter deals with the first verse of the song, and if you read the lyrics, you will find many similarities in here. I hope you enjoyed this. Please let me know your thoughts, if you will. I do so appreciate hearing them. :)**


	2. Loss of the Unloving

**Loss of the Unloving**

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Ashes.

There had been plenty of ash flying around that night, a century ago, when Lord Voldemort and his Death Eaters had begun to tear Hogwarts to the ground in their search for Harry Potter, extinguishing the boy's vigilante followers left and right, as if their lives had been candles, to be snuffed out and leaving nothing behind but a faint sprinkling of ashes. At that time, Lord Voldemort had aimed to become the leader of the world, but instead he was now leading Wizarding Britain, and the only ashes nowadays were those in his mouth, left by the staleness of his once grand aims.

Harry Potter's resistance fighters had crumbled to dust, their resistance gone in the slightest whisper of the wind carrying the news of the boy's death. They had been so easy to conquer, so easy to kill, so easy – _too_ easy, almost. Too easy, certainly, now, in the knowledge that retrospective brought: that their resistance had been the only one to be expected in Lord Voldemort's conquest of the United Kingdom. He should have relished the fight more, he had later realized, while the whole wizarding populace of Britain fell to his feet, stumbling in their haste to lay down any ideas of upheaval they might ever have possessed. Lord Voldemort had wanted to become a conqueror, great in his victory over the misled fighters that would stand (and fall) against him, but instead he had become a shepherd, ruling a population of sheep, and trying not to die of the annoyance at their constant _bah-ba-a-ah_ -ing.

"Bella," he spoke to the witch lying upon the bed in the room adjacent to his. "What have I become?"

 _Nothing_ , was the answer that would never come. Not only had his blood-filled battlefield of conquest turned into a sickly-green meadow of sheep droppings that might as well be counted as nothing. No, Lord Voldemort had also had to abstain from any development at all – _becoming_ anything was impossible for him, as his body was in a constant state of stagnancy. There was _nothing_ he had become, and nothing he _could_ become anymore – which was exactly as he had wanted it once, but now he found that perhaps the journey _was_ the reward after all, only he was incapable of journeying anymore, having reached the only destination he would ever reach, and having found that it was not to his liking.

 _Nothing_.

Bella would have lied to him, of course, told him flatteries that she believed to be true with the bottom of her blackened heart that only beat for Lord Voldemort, but Bella was dying. Had been dying for a long time, in fact. She was travelling the only road on which she could not walk beside her master, for it was a road he had denied himself a long time ago.

Bella was the only one left. All his other Death Eaters had gone into politics, were heading abstract departments, had founded families and settled down, away from the Dark Lord's immediate side. Yes, he was Minister of Magic, but he did little actual ruling these days, rarely left the Lestrange Estate to show himself in the Ministry – had the last time been a decade past already? Two? He could not remember, nor did he care to.

Some of his followers had quietly slipped from the United Kingdom, travelling across the borders of the country they had conquered, to make their lives in a better world. In the beginning, he had had them hunted down, brought before his throne, and had punished them severely. That had soon stopped, however, for Lord Voldemort had found that he could not blame them for hating the same thing he did, and so he had let them go away. Everyone did, after all, in the end. Let them go. Lord Voldemort did not need them.

Only his precious Bella had stayed with him. Bella, sweet Bella, whose admiration was never ceasing, sweet Bella who had been craving his attention, always. When his reign had turned out to be less than he'd hoped for it to be, his temper had deteriorated – rapidly. That was when his followers had first begun to flee, he knew, into family, work, or across the sea. Only Bella had stayed, never fearing the punishment that was certain to come, desiring it as much as any affection he ever chose to bestow upon her.

He had wanted her to rule the world as his second-in-command, but the world had turned out to be an island full of sheep, nothing but a huge pile of dung. An Empire of dirt, if there had ever been one. He would still give it to her today, if only to see his sweet Bella reintroduce chaos and fear into the everyday life of his sheep. Now, of course, she was too old and too weak to do so, but he knew that if only she was able to stand up from her dying bed, she would try. Try, for him, for Lord Voldemort, who was everything to her insane little world.

It was no novel idea, to have Bella rule in his stead. He had promised it to her, when she had first joined him in the bloom of her youth. It had been Lord Voldemort's promise for her sixteenth birthday, and he had renewed that promise again and again over the years that it took them to conquer Great Britain.

But of course, being the wizard that he was, Lord Voldemort had gone back on his word the moment Harry Potter had been dead and the title of Minister had been his. The only command he had ever allowed her was that over correcting her own mistakes. It had not taken her long to learn that even if she did Lord Voldemort's bidding, he might still punish her for that. Those were the mistakes she had been granted freedom to correct, mistakes that had never even _been_ mistakes, and still she corrected them to the best of her abilities, and was – again – punished for trying.

 _Sweet Bella_ , he remembered. She had revelled in the pain he used to cause her, had adored every minute of his sole attention and his wand being trained on her. Where his other followers had shrunk away in fear of the pain, she had embraced it as the gift that it was from her beloved master.

He had let her down, sweet, powerful, insane young Bella, only now she wasn't young anymore. He had made her hurt, more than any of his other Death Eaters, and she had never once complained. The only time she had begged for mercy was when he had given her to the one who could never rule her – not that anyone other than Lord Voldemort had ever been able to truly rule her – and she had been sold into the marriage to Rodolphus Lestrange. She had been the blackest of the Black, and he had estranged her. But even then, her resistance had been short-lived for she had trusted her master, her faith never wavering, her zeal never ceasing.

Only now, sweet Bella did waver, did cease to exist, for she was dying.

Or was she?

No.

She was already dead.


	3. Regrets of the Unrepentant

**Regrets of the Unrepentant**

* * *

Everything was a lie.

Ruling over his kingdom of sheep, Lord Voldemort looked upon the wooden throne he had climbed and found it to be a lie.

All those years ago, now some one and a half centuries past, Lord Voldemort had risen as a messiah, heralding a brave new world, come to lead Wizardkind into a better future. He had revolted against the ingrained institution of liars, calling themselves politicians and leading Britain in a fake democracy. At least with him, the people knew that there would be no vote, faux or true, and still they had followed him, for they had _believed_ in him.

His life had been religion to the ones who worshipped him, his name a prayer upon their lips, to be revered and not to be taken in vain, and they had sacrificed their souls to be part of his movement. A messiah, yes, that was who they had seen him as, but Lord Voldemort had not been stupid enough to sacrifice himself. He had never been one for sacrifice, and death truly was a vulgar notion, better left to lesser men.

But having freed Wizarding Britain from the lies that had reigned before his conquest, his own reign had soon turned to lies itself. The messiah had become a politician, and lying had become his second nature. And still, the sheep believed, for who were they to question their shepherd?

After a while, when no one had challenged him, he had begun to throw red herrings to the people, making up abhorrent scandals that should have caused ordinary people to protest, to revolt, to upheave the system he himself had set into place. But there had been no tangible reaction, for his reign was not ordinary, and neither were his people. They were _extra_ ordinarily subdued, and would always remain thus, it seemed.

His throne was broken.

He had climbed it as a revolutionary, and sat there as a conservative. The old ideas that he had fought to implement were now firmly in place. Blood supremacy was the rule, patriarchy was stronger than ever, and nobody dared venture between Muggle and Wizarding world. His ideas and his ideals had been broken in the way that they had become wholesome to the extent of standard, but Lord Voldemort was not one for standards, nor for broken things. He was the Breaker of Things, but he had broken Britain, and now there was nothing left for him to conquer here.

A revolutionary he had been, and a revolutionary he had wanted to remain, but the revolution had died the moment it had succeeded. Revitalising it had become impossible. What would he do? Anything that might be considered revolutionary these days would be the opposite of what he believed in, and even if he decided to implement some new ideas, there would be no resistance, for he was the Minister of Magic, and his word was law.

Lord Voldemort smiled, almost wistfully.

 _Oh Bella._

If there was someone who could still cause upheaval in the most peaceful of times, it would be his sweet Bella. If only there was a way to put her in the Minister's seat – the results would be a sight to behold.

But alas, several reasons prohibited that.

For one, the patriarchy was strong, and they would not be led by a woman, no matter her power, or her magical abilities, or her warden.

Secondly, Bella was dead, and would inspire no more life in the equally lifeless wizarding populace.

And lastly, yet most importantly: that seat was Lord Voldemort's, and Lord Voldemort did not share.

There had been life amongst his sheep in the first few years or so, he remembered. There had been celebrations and the like, excitement that came with peace, liberation that came with the end of terror. But the majority of the current population was too young to have lived during either of the two Wizarding Wars, and they did not appreciate Lord Voldemort's rule as they should. Life had become bland, and what vibrancy had been to be had before had faded into inexistence.

Vibrant was what Bella had been once, as well, but the terror she had used to inspire had died away, quietly, unmourned by anyone but him. She had been so full of life and a dangerous, maddened, hysteric kind of joy which even repeated bouts of Crucio could not diminish. These days, her body could not take the Cruciatus curse as well anymore as it used to. Never before had Lord Voldemort had to take care that Bella did not break under his lovingly bestowed punishment, but now she had become frail, her body having aged that much faster for the years spent in Azkaban.

Bella had been beautiful once, in her youth. She'd been voluptuous, vibrant, vicious as a viper: elegant and enticing, yet deadly. If he'd been a sentimental wizard then, he might even have proclaimed to love her. Of course, if he was a sentimental wizard, he would be calling her beautiful still. Then again, if Bella was alive, _she_ would call _him_ beautiful, as well, when the whole world feared his face.

It was of no consequence, though. The only beauty that existed for Lord Voldemort lay not in outward appearances, but in power. And even that mattered little these days. He was the most powerful wizard alive, but he was as cold as ever, and Bella was dead, so neither of them would be called beautiful by the other ever again.

Bella's death had changed their relationship, he found, had changed _her_. Lord Voldemort himself, of course, was still very much the same. He did not bow to change, did not heed the laws of time as mortals did. He was a god walking the earth, an Undying One amongst the living. He did not yield to age, to erosion, to decay. He was, and would always be, unchanged, unchanging, stagnant.

Stagnant.

The hated word.

At times, he almost envied Bella for her ability to change, to develop, even if into something lesser, for when better to strive for improvement than at the bottom of the world? But then he remembered that the only changes Bella would go through were those forced upon her by biodeterioration, and he did not envy her for that even one bit. Her soul had always been rotten and he had admired her for that, but now her very existence was rotting away, and the mere notion of that held no beauty whatsoever.

Lord Voldemort was immortal, and that was a good thing.

It was.

Yes, it was.


	4. Fall of the Unyielding

**Fall of the Unyielding**

* * *

A box of trinkets lay at Bella's feet. He had put it there, or as well as, he had it _had_ put there. The box contained all the broken pieces of Lord Voldemort's soul that he now had no use for anymore. Ancient artefacts, some of them, he thought, as he looked upon the broken Amulet of Slytherin without emotion.

All in all, he surmised, Bella's bedroom was now a chamber in which to store his dead playthings. Precious once, all of them, back when they'd still been beautiful, but broken now – useless.

If there had been any humour left in him, he might have found it almost funny how he had never thought to take precautions against Bella's final departure. He told himself that it was because she'd been too vibrant, too proud, too stubborn to succumb to some plebeian notion such as death. Surely she'd been above that, his sweet Bella.

Nagini knew better, though, and the giant snake visibly shivered under the dark, empty stare her master graced her with, admonishing her for her own admonishing gaze. The beast knew too much. Knew that Lord Voldemort had never helped his most valued lieutenant escape death because he had wanted to be the only immortal one. Bella had always come first on his list of priorities, but he had only ever perused that list when his own desires had been fulfilled, every last one of them.

It was upsetting, in a way, that his own hubris had made him lose the only thing that might have anchored him to his sanity – the insane witch who had died without him noticing. Would it have been so bad to have another wracked piece of soul by his side? He could have held on to her horcrux, could have crushed her when it suited him, it wouldn't have needed to be forever, just a little longer than _this_.

Sweet Bella – the only reminder of what it had been like to be a revolutionary.

He wanted to implore her to stay with him, offer her his very own crown and throne; he'd lay it all down at her feet, if only she would stay.

What he'd instead laid down at her feet was a box of broken pieces of his soul. How she had longed to have a tiny piece of his soul all for herself. How sad for her that love and devotion were no notions that Lord Voldemort fancied to entertain.

She had been ecstatic when she'd been allowed to care for the Cup of Hufflepuff. She had been crushed when she'd been told to keep it in her vault at all times, and not to visit her vault anymore in case somebody wondered what she was doing there. But she had valued that idea that she had a piece of Lord Voldemort all to herself. Sweet Bella, she had been crazy that way.

Lord Voldemort missed it, the craziness, the insanity, always just around the corner, one needed to only lean forward a little and it would grab you, pull you in, pull you under, and –

Those times were long past now. He had ruled insanity, while insanity had ruled Bella, and together they had overpowered the old regime and set into place their own ideals. Lord Voldemort would rather have remained a revolutionary. Knowing as he did these days that life was not worth living, not truly, after one had accomplished one's revolution, perhaps he might not have created this number of horcruxes. Maybe he would have elected to remain mortal, or closer to mortal than he was these days, anyway, if only to really experience the excitement and the thrill that came with the actual, the _real_ threat of death.

He wondered how her death had been. Some deaths hurt, as Harry Potter's fall at Lord Voldemort's wand had proven. Some deaths were so painless one did not even realize that one had died, as Slytherin's locket and Ravenclaw's diadem had shown. Had Bella suffered in death? Did he even care?

Bella had lived. Lived for him, and died alone, but she had lived first. He had left her to the pains of old age, for she had revelled in pain in her youth, and he had allowed her to possess a mortal body. That body was decaying, had given in to death, and Lord Voldemort had been repulsed by the weakness that the mere notion of dying carried. Bella had been a powerful witch, but then she had died, and that was simply something he could not admire, nor even respect.

Perhaps Bella had the right of it, though, he wondered. Perhaps it truly was better to die fighting for something, better than living to see one's own ideals and ideas and accomplishments turn into disappointment. Better than witnessing one's own decay, or the decay of those who had been key to this revolution.

After all, what had this revolution been worth? The muggles had done a far better job over the past century at banishing themselves from the surface of the Earth – either by bombing themselves to dust, or by mounting a craft that would transport them to their new extra-terrestrial colonies – than he had managed to accomplish within the fifty years of his violent conquest.

Lord Voldemort had not wanted to watch Bella die, but she had died anyway, and now she was dead. Lord Voldemort would have made her a queen, would have given up the rule that he hated anyway, for her to take up the sceptre and rule in his stead. But those days were gone, the moment was past, and would never come back.

Looking upon a charred piece of elven-wrought silver, he picked up what was left of Rowena Ravenclaw's diadem. Placing it upon Bella's brow, Lord Voldemort was almost smiling at the sight.

Bella looked regal, even in death. The only kingdom she would ever reign was that of worms and maggots, but damn him to hell if he did not at least grant her the crown she deserved so much.

Bella was an empress, Lord Voldemort thought fondly, _his_ empress.

An empress of dirt.

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 **A/N: Thank you all for reading, and for those stunning reviews I've received! I am moved by how much positive attention this little story has been honoured with so far. Thank you ever so much.**

 **This song fic is over, having moved through first verse, chorus, second verse, and again the chorus and repetition in these four chapters. There are two more song fics to be found amongst my published stories here ( _Rest in Peace_ and _Don't Wanna Dance_ ), and four more are to come at some point in the future.**

 **As always, chapter-individual aesthetics can be found on my Facebook page ( _MarcellaDix_ ), in case you're interested. I will now get back to writing _Accommodations_ , this huge WIP that I've been working on for the past year. Check it out, if you like? ;)**

 **Thanks again, and take care,**

 **Marcella xxx**


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